Archive for the ‘Events of interest’ Category

Georgetown Law’s Center on National Security and the Law and National Security Law Society are hosting a panel discussion, “Surveillance and Foreign Intelligence Gathering in the United States: The Current State of Play.” The keynote address will be from Rep. Jim Sensenbrenner (R-Wis.), and the panel will include: Jameel Jaffer – Director, American Civil Liberties Union, Center for Democracy; Robert Litt – General Counsel, Office of the Director of National Intelligence; Matthew Olsen – Former General Counsel, National Security Agency; Marc Rotenberg – President and Executive Director, Electronic Privacy Information Center; Laura K. Donohue – Professor, Georgetown Law (moderator). RSVP to rsvp2@law.georgetown.edu

The Senate Judiciary Committee’s Subcommittee on Privacy, Technology and the Law, chaired by Sen. Al Franken (D-Minn.), will hold a hearing on the Surveillance Transparency Act of 2013, “A bill to enhance transparency for certain surveillance programs authorized by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978 and for other purposes.” The witness list has not been released.

The Privacy Rights Clearinghouse, which last month published a report concerning the privacy of individuals’ medical data on health apps, will be hosting a webinar on medical apps and privacy on Oct. 29. Registration is free (simply e-mail bethg@privacyrights.org). Here’s more:

Smartphones are ideal tracking tools. People carry them almost everywhere they go, and they rarely turn them off. This capability allows for great consumer tools and benefits. At the same time, smartphones and the apps people download can be highly privacy invasive.

The mobile app ecosystem is largely unregulated, and people often make the mistake of assuming that an app is developed with privacy in mind.

On Sunday, May 19 at 7 p.m. ET and PT, “60 Minutes” will have include a segment, “A Face in the Crowd,” on the issue of privacy and facial-recognition technology. Here’s what “60 Minutes” says:

The odds are you are not just a face in the crowd any longer. Even if your picture isn’t plastered all over social networking and photo-sharing sites, facial recognition technology in public places is making it harder if not impossible to remain anonymous. Lesley Stahl reports on the new ways this technology is being used that even has one of its inventors calling it too intrusive. Her 60 MINUTES report will be broadcast Sunday, May 19 (7:00-8:00 PM, ET/PT) on the CBS Television Network.

Professor Alessandro Acquisti of Carnegie Mellon, who researches how technology impacts privacy, stunned Stahl with an experiment. He photographed random students on the campus and in short order, not only identified several of them, but in a number of cases found their personal information, including social security numbers, just using a facial recognition program he downloaded for free. Read more »

Consumer Reports is hosting a panel discussion, “Consumer Trade-offs in a Mobile Culture: Privacy, Payments and Social Media,” on May 1 in New York City. Here’s more information:

Join Consumer Reports for an in-depth discussion about mobile technology and the ways that it has fundamentally changed our culture.
A panel of consumer advocates, mobile proponents, and industry experts will explore the upsides and downsides of an increasingly mobile world. The conversation will weigh the benefits and opportunities of mobile services against the risks they pose to privacy and security.

Patient Privacy Rights and Microsoft are hosting a panel discussion, “Unintended Consequences: Patient Perspectives on the HIPAA Omnibus Rule,” on April 25 in Washington, D.C. Here’s more information:

While the Department of Health and Human Services offered some clarity on HIPAA’s broad privacy powers, patients are still largely in the dark. After 500+ pages of regulations, questions remain about what health providers should do to comply with HIPAA. Patients deserve to understand how their personal health information is protected, who has access to it, and how patients can manage their own data. How will the new regulations affect them and their healthcare coverage? How are healthcare providers changing their protocols, if at all? Is sensitive patient data more protected from security breaches, and if not, where can we go from here?

We hope to move the dialogue forward so patients can benefit from new technologies while understanding how their privacy is protected. Join us for a lunch conversation to explore these issues at the next installment of our @Microsoft event series.